(Closed) Wedding Coordinator Question…

So…I always knew I wanted to hire a wedding coordinator when the big day came – primarily for 2 reasons:

1) I don’t want to make ANY last minute stressful decisions the day of my wedding – I want someone else there dealing with the “issues” I know are bound to come

2) I need help with direction. I have lots of creativity – perhaps too much – and it is helpful for me when I have someone to reel it all in!

1 month before we got engaged we attended my fiancés best friends sisters wedding – such a wonderful wedding! Everything was perfect and flawless! My dear fiancé informed me that a very good family friend of his was the coordinator – and that she had also coordinated his sisters wedding years early (which I attended also, but our relationship was quite new at the time). Flash forward a month, I got the ring of my dreams and the planning was underway. Dear fiancé called the wedding coordinator friend to tell her the news and she insisted I call her. She works in quite an expensive and well off area – so I knew she’d have good taste. Not to mention – I could figure the two weddings I’d seen that she planned were well over my budget. Anyways, I called her and met with her and LOVE her. She is wonderful. And given that it was late November 2010 and we wanted to get married in October 2011 she was able to provide me the direction I needed to get the big things nailed down.

Here comes the question/tricky part. At a point in my budgeting I asked her for help with all of the expenses and developing my budget (we were trying to decide if we could afford an expensive band AND photographer). She indicated that she was not charging a fee and was happy to help us as such good family friends. It appears my fiancés sister did pay her, and her full fee at that $4k. She told me no fee. So here is what I am wondering:

1) Do I pay her the full fee?

2) Do I pay her a portion? (I think this might be rude)

3) Do we give her a VERY nice gift as a thank you?

Sometimes I think its rude when someone tells you they want to give you something and you pay them anyways. Also, if we decide to pay her the full amount I feel like I need to communicate this so that I am getting the full benefit. Not saying I think she would treat me any different, but if she is doing it as a gift she may not put all the focus she normally would on it.